Bullet Dodging at New Hope Church with the 93rd Ohio


The following account from Private Daniel W. Sheidler of the 93rd Ohio recounts his intense experiences dodging Rebel bullets during the Union assault at the Battle of Pickett's Mills, also known as New Hope Church, on May 27, 1864. Pickett's Mills proved one of the hardest fought engagements of the Atlanta campaign, and one that didn't go well for the Union as is evidenced by the heavy casualty lists incurred during the assault on the Confederate lines that day. My wife's great-great-great grandfather was one of those wounded, so the story of this battle is of additional interest to me personally. 

This battle has previously been discussed on this blog in "Inside the Crime of Pickett's Mills: Voices from the 49th Ohio" from last May which can be viewed here. Scheidler's story appeared in the March 17, 1898 issue of the National Tribune. 


One of the more dramatic scenes from Sheidler's account occurred when a lieutenant of the 124th Ohio rose from behind their shared log and was promptly shot down. "One of his company ran from the rear to him and leaning over him said, “Lieutenant, are you badly hurt?” Scarcely had the words been spoken when he fell, killed outright," Sheidler wrote. 

I wish to tell of my experience at New Hope Church. I was a member of Co. E, 93rd Ohio, belonging to the Second Brigade, Third Division, Fourth Corps. The morning of May 27 broke cloudy and the forenoon was decidedly sultry. The very atmosphere was ominous. The expression was frequently heard during the advance, “Oh, we’ll catch it today. We’ll get into it.” My comrades marched steadily and resolutely, it proved to many of them, to their death.

          Our brigade was commanded by General William B. Hazen, and composed of the 5th Kentucky, 6th Indiana, 124th Ohio, and 93rd Ohio. We formed line of battle and with fixed bayonets advanced with orders, as we understood it, to charge Rebels wherever found. The march through fields, over hills and hollows, through brush and timber during that hot day was tough on us. In the afternoon we halted on top of a ridge where we lay, seemingly awaiting orders. We afterwards learned that Generals Hazen and Wood, our commanders, did not want to make a charge at this point, feeling it would turn out just as it did, and that Hazen received the order the third time before ordering us to advance.

          About 5 p.m., the bugle sounded the advance and our brigade moved down into a ravine and up a hill, the left wing striking an open field, the right wing the timber; the left of my regiment was in the field. Here we encountered the Rebel skirmishers, driving them across the field to their breastworks. Part of our brigade advanced some of the way across the field but fell back to the edge of the timber where our line of battle was held. The right of the brigade rested on a ridge at the right of the field in the timber. I followed the fence at the right of the field, passing through a thicket, beyond which I could see a big log and made a quick run, dropping down behind it.
General William Babcock Hazen

          A lieutenant of the 124th Ohio and another soldier sought protection at my right. The firing was very brisk from both sides. Looking over the log, I could see the Rebels about 150 yards in our front and one Johnny in particular drew my attention. I rested my Enfield on the log and fired at him, dropping down again to reload. I heard a Rebel bullet strike the log on the side opposite me. Again I took a shot at the fellow and dropped behind the log again, just in time to hear neighbor Johnny’s bullet thud into the log. I reloaded, took another survey and could, as I thought, see plainly Johnny Reb. Leveling my gun a third time, I fired and dropped just in time to hear the third rebel bullet hit the log.

          At this stage, the lieutenant at my right arose and pointed with his sword in the direction of the Rebels. He was at once badly wounded and fell back behind the log again. One of his company ran from the rear to him and leaning over him said, “Lieutenant, are you badly hurt?” Scarcely had the words been spoken when he fell, killed outright. The Rebels had charged around on our left and had an enfilading fire on our line and my log was no protection to me. So I made another run to a big tree a little in the rear and straightened up behind it.

          A Rebel bullet from our left passed between me and the tree, knocking the bark into my face and convincing me that there was no safe side to that tree. I beat a hasty retreat to where I found most of our regiment and company under cover of the ridge. The lieutenant wounded behind the log was the same man who, after our brigade had charged and taken possession of the ridge at Resaca when that Rebel masked battery on our right opened with grape and canister enfilading our line, persisted in walking up and down the line directing his men to “keep that battery silenced.” I never saw him with his regiment after he was wounded. What became of him and what his name was, I do not know. He was a brave soldier.
This image showing the tangled undergrowth at Resaca could equally apply at Pickett's Mills. 

          Our brigade was relieved about sundown or dusk and that night we built a line of breastworks to the right of the battlefield. Next morning we found our breastworks were endways to the enemy and of course had to change them. This was on May 28th and a fearful thunderstorm came up. It seemed as if the clouds were almost in the tree tops and peal after peal of thunder rolled and rumbled and the lightning flashed, adding additional gloom to the situation.

          Two soldiers in a brigade near us were standing by a tree. One of them said while it was thundering, “That’s the kind of cannonading that doesn’t hurt anyone.” Scarcely had the words been said when lightning struck the tree and killed both of them, the shock being felt by our whole brigade.

Daniel W. Sheidler, Co. E, 93rd Ohio, Holden, Missouri

Comments

  1. Joe ReinhartMay 24, 2020 at 8:37 AM

    Hazen's brigade constituted of four battalions: (1st) 93rd Ohio and 124th Ohio; (2nd) 5th Ky. and 6th Ind.; (3)6th Ky. and 23rd Ky.; and (4th) 1st Ohio and 41st Ohio. OR38, pt. 1, p. 92. The regiments had been greatly reduced by battle losses and disease. The 6th Ky. fielded only 106 men in May.

    ReplyDelete
  2. UnknownMay 30, 2020 at 2:30 PM

    This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

    ReplyDelete
  3. UnknownJune 28, 2021 at 3:58 PM

    Remember, the engagement at Pickett's Mill for years, was called east of New Hope. The 93rd fought in what is now, Pickett's Mill Georgia State Park, from 27th May 12864 until 4 June when the confederates retreated. Gen. Schofield broke and turned the confederate line. The State of Georgia, still keeps up the false history, that Pickett's Mill was a 5 hour engagement. If you want to read the truth on face book, its under (PICKETT'S MILL 10 DAYS OF COMBAT

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Most Popular Posts

Arming the Buckeyes: Longarms of the Ohio Infantry Regiments

Image
     A common question that comes up in conversation about Civil War Buckeye regiments is "What were they armed with?" We are fortunate in that the state of Ohio kept good records of how the regiments were armed when they went into service, this being especially true for those regiments which went into service in 1861 and 1862. The state adjutant general's reports for 1861 and 1862 have been heavily drawn upon to construct this article, as well as consultation with Phil Spaugy who has done extensive research on how Ohio's troops were armed during the war.      Buckeyes carried a fairly wide variety of weapons into the field, and the below article breaks this down into weapons of both domestic manufacture and imported arms. The early days of the war found the state of Ohio practically bereft of longarms; as an example, when the 1st and 2nd Ohio Volunteer Militia left the state in late April 1861, they left unarmed, being armed at Lancaster, Pennsylvania on their way to
Read more

Dressing the Rebels: How to Dye Butternut Jeans Cloth

Image
     In the early days of the Civil War,  the Southern states found themselves with an abundance of cotton but a shortage of cloth with which to make army uniforms. The trade in cloth prior to the war had largely been to send raw cotton or wool north to New England (or Great Britain) where it was converted into usable cloth; but now that trade was broken and the Southern states were thrown upon their own resources in their efforts to properly clothe the Confederate army.  This collection of Confederate enlisted men's frock coats and shell jackets gives some indication of the variety of shades of butternut worn during the war. All of them are shades of yellow brown, some heavier on the yellow and some heavier on the brown. The blue used around the collar or as rank insignia indicates that the soldier was in the infantry. Surviving Confederate uniforms are considered rather rare and command quite a healthy price in the collecting market. For an in-depth study of how Confederate jacke
Read more

Bullets for the Union: Manufacturing Small Arms Ammunition During the Civil War

Image
       Civil War bullets are perhaps the most common item collected from the era; the two armies expended bullets by the millions during the four years’ conflict and spent or deformed bullets of all shapes and sizes have made fascinating and affordable collectibles since the guns went silent in 1865.       I recently acquired a display piece featuring 35 different types of small arms ammunition used during the Civil War, including everything from a small .28 caliber ball up to a .69 caliber three-ring Minie and it triggered some questions: how did the Federal army obtain its small arms ammunition during the war? Where did the lead come from to make the bullets, and where and how was the ammunition manufactured? This post seeks to answer those questions. A typical .58 caliber 3-ring Minie bullet   “Whenever the blasts of war blow in the ears of men who trade in the implements of destruction, they are apt to experience more joy than the true warrior, for then comes the harvest of gain.
Read more

The Cannons are Now Silent: The Field of Death of Tupelo

Image
       The smoke of battle had drifted away from the battlefield at Tupelo, Mississippi on the hot afternoon of July 14, 1864, but the carnage of war lay spread across the open fields. “Scattered at intervals over the field of a few yards are dull gray blotches half shaded by grass,” an officer from the 7 th Minnesota Infantry recorded. “These are the Rebel dead. They have fought their last battle and lie generally in attitudes of rest; some of them look as if they had welcomed death. On the faces of two is imprinted a smile. One is a boy of 16 with delicate features, almost girlish in their beauty. His last gaze seems to have been directed toward his hand on the forefinger of which was a ring. A circle of purer white indicates its place; the ring was carried off as a trophy of the field.” The following account of the Battles of Tupelo and Old Town Creek was written by an unknown officer of the 7 th Minnesota Infantry, his account appearing in the August 5 th 1864 edition of the
Read more

The Vaunted Enfield Rifle Musket

Image
     The English-made Model 1853 .577 caliber Enfield Rifle Musket was widely regarded as the best infantry arm in the world at the outbreak of the Civil War in April 1861. Favorable international press describing its efficiency in the Crimean War and in suppressing the Indian rebellion led to the widespread desire of American infantrymen (both Federal and Confederate) to be armed with these accurate and well-made arms. The lock plate of this well-worn P1853 Enfield rifle musket produced in 1862 shows the typical markings of a British-made weapon that made it through the Federal blockade.  ( Army of Tennessee Relics ) Enfield-pattern weapons were imported into the states by the tens and hundreds of thousands during the war years; one estimate stated that the Federal government purchased 500,000 while the Confederates purchased another 400,000. The Confederate government dispatched Captain Caleb Huse to Europe in April 1861 to purchase weapons and Huse focused on securing all the Enfi
Read more

Straw Already Threshed: Sherman on Shiloh

Image
  W illiam Tecumseh Sherman was enjoying retired life in New York City when just before Christmas in 1889 he was presented with an article written by John Cockerill, a former drummer boy in the 24 th Ohio who was visiting his father Colonel Joseph Cockerill of the 70 th Ohio of Sherman’s division when the Battle of Shiloh began. Cockerill’s article, originally published in the New York Journalist and later featured in the January 1893 issue of Blue & Gray Magazine, Sherman later pronounced as “the best war story ever written” and the truest account of Shiloh.           On New Year’s Day 1890, General Sherman composed the following letter to his friend Marshall P. Wilder thanking him for sending along Cockerill’s article and giving his own explanation of Shiloh. “This to me is straw already threshed for we have fought this battle on paper several times, a much more agreeable task than to fight with bullets,” he concluded. “When in England some years ago I was gratified to liste
Read more

Federal Arms in the Stones River Campaign

Image
  T he following list, constructed after many years of research, lists unit by unit which type of weapons were carried by the Army of the Cumberland during the Stones River campaign. A number of sources were consulted including state ordnance reports, Federal quarterly ordnance reports (thank you Research Arsenal ), Ken Baumann’s Arming the Suckers, regimental histories and memoirs, captured ordnance reports, and consultation with knowledgeable experts in the field of firearms. Some of this information has been shared on the blog before in “ Rosy’s Heavy Metal: Artillery of the Army of the Cumberland ” or “ Shoulder Arms: How Sheridan’s and Davis’s Divisions Were Armed at Stones River ” but this is the first time the army as a whole has been presented. The overall conclusion I drew from looking at this data is that the Army of the Cumberland in December 1862 was an organization in the midst of transformation as far as arms. Many of the regiments still retained their original issue
Read more

Escape of Captain Henry H. Alban of the 21st Ohio Infantry

Image
Captain Henry H. Alban was among the dozen officers of the 21 st Ohio Volunteer Infantry who were captured on September 20, 1863 at the Battle of Chickamauga. The regiment had held its position atop Snodgrass Hill against repeated Confederate assaults and now battered and without ammunition, with the darkness of evening enveloping the hill, the remainder of that gallant band found themselves at the mercy of the 54 th Virginia. A total of 12 officers and 121 enlisted men surrendered; the regiment’s colors were taken, and the men marched off the field into captivity. Captain Henry Harvey Alban, Co. F, 21st O.V.I. Captain Alban along with the rest went through a series of Confederate prison camps before arriving at Columbia, South Carolina in October 1864. Determined to make an escape, he watched for his chance and one night made his leap for freedom, successfully eluding the local camp guard and setting out along the railroad to head for the mountains of eastern Tennessee and
Read more

Knapsack Compression: Wilbur Hinman recalls the first step of becoming a veteran

Image
L ooking back on his experiences during the war, Captain Wilbur Hinman of the 65 th Ohio (perhaps best known as the author of Si Klegg and His Pard ) recalled that the first road along which his regiment marched was strewn “with debris. A pair of six-mule wagonloads might have been gathered of notions that had been flung aside by a thousand suffering “tenderfeet.” “The average young patriot started for the war with a wheelbarrow load of clothing, a bed quilt or two, books, photograph albums, toilet articles, and gimcracks of every sort,” he wrote. “Neither he nor the good homefolks had the slightest conception of the capacity of a knapsack, nor did they for a moment imagine that before the close of his first day upon the road every pound he carried would seem a hundred.” To the true mark of a veteran soldier was one who “learned to dispense with every unnecessary ounce of weight, and just in the ratio that he did this he increased his efficiency as a soldier. It was of the highest
Read more

Federal Arms in the Chickamauga Campaign

Image
T he ordnance returns of the Army of the Cumberland at the end of September 1863 show the results of a transformational year in weaponry. Since taking command of the army at the end of October 1862, General William S. Rosecrans had repeatedly pestered the War Department to supply his regiments with better firearms both to improve the command’s efficiency as well as expand its striking power. The results speak for themselves: for the infantrymen at the end of September 1863, 90% of them now carried Class I long arms (36,058 out of 39,959), 8.3% carried Class II arms, and a mere 1.5% carried Class III weapons. Most of the foreign-made weapons (except Enfields) were gone, and by and large the army had settled on a single common .58 caliber ammunition, although a few .54 caliber and .69 caliber weapons remained within the ranks. The English-made Enfield rifle musket was by far the most common arm, carried by 56% of the men while the second-most common arm was the .58 caliber M1861 Spring
Read more